


Round and round we go

by LeFay_Strent



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Gen, Kinda Dark, the coffee shop au that nobody wanted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2018-12-10
Packaged: 2019-09-15 20:09:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16939872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeFay_Strent/pseuds/LeFay_Strent
Summary: Logan stood there long after the commotion began outside, the one where everyone realized what had happened and were running to help and call an ambulance.





	Round and round we go

There are some days that you can never forget. Some of them you don’t consider as important at the time until they resurface years later, and you’ll ask yourself why, of all the memories, your brain decided this one was too important to let go. Just as well, there are moments in life that occur and you know without a doubt, then and there, that you will remember that day forever.          

For Logan, the day itself would remember him

He sat in a coffee shop down the street from his place of work. Most mornings, before he began the daily grind of his job, he chose to wake his sleepy mind over a cup of caffeine. At the wide windows he’d sit, half the time huddling over the warmth between his hands. The other half he’d spend gazing out the glass, content to stare emptily at the passing cars and bodies. Sometimes his coffee tasted just right and he’d sip the rich, sweetness down. Other times, no amount of creamer or sugar could sweeten the bitterness.        

Today, Logan couldn’t find it in himself to drink pass the halfway mark. Really, he should have seen it as a sign of things to come, but more and more these days he couldn’t wrap his cynical thoughts around the idea that everything happens for a reason.         

That’s why he was startled by the man sprinting down the sidewalk. Maybe he wouldn’t have noticed him even then, but just as he was passing Logan’s spot by the window, he tripped on the curb and stumbled to the side. He didn’t fall, merely lost momentum and had to right himself, giving him the perfect opportunity to look up and let their gazes meet.          

He had a frenzied air about him. A tall figure, lanky limbs swathed in a patchworked hoodie. His brown and purple-dyed hair stuck up in places, having been blown back in the man’s mad dash, or maybe it was always so disheveled. The under part of his eyes was so dark that make-up had to have been used, the product standing out against pale skin and making his deep brown eyes pop.          

Those eyes seemed alarmed, not at the near fall, but at Logan himself. There was an intensity there that gave Logan the most peculiar sense of invasiveness, like the man saw more than him or into his very being. Whatever the man saw, it left him stock-still and staring.          

Then suddenly an emotion flickered in his eyes, something akin to realization, and his cheeks strained in a large grin. Barely-there crinkles edged the corners of his eyes as something danced in his irises. Relief. Happiness. Affection? Logan couldn’t place it. Whatever it was, it stole his breath and built a wispy connection between them. That connection, he couldn’t explain it fully, but he knew that it was important, precarious, and affected him strong enough to make Logan cry out when the bus hit him.          

They’d been too busy staring at each other. Neither of them noticed how the man stood on the road vulnerably. The bus driver didn’t notice either, as he would attest to later. The massive vehicle slammed into the man at over forty miles-an-hour—a blur that sent him flying across the concrete. Logan couldn’t see where he landed, but what he did see had him standing on his feet before he registered the movement. He knew that he shouted something, knew that his drink spilled over the table and the other patrons must have been looking at him. Somewhere in his mind though, he’d shut off everything else besides this one incident.          

The man. The bus. The impact.

Logan stood there long after the commotion began outside, the one where everyone realized what had happened and were running to help and call an ambulance. He should be out there too. He should tell someone what happened, that the man had been staring at him when it happened. He should see if he was okay. But in his gut the knowledge boiled nauseously.          

The man was dead. He died and Logan had watched it happen.          

When he finally left the coffee shop, Logan didn’t wade through the crowd. He didn’t go to work either. His legs carried him mechanically, one automatic step after the other. Eventually he found himself at home with hardly any recollection of how he came to be there. Listlessly, Logan wandered around his apartment in endless circles, confused when he stared into the pantry or when he sat by his half-filled laundry basket. He didn’t know what to do with himself.          

At some point, his phone rang. Logan didn’t remember hearing it, nor answering.          

“Logan, what the hell?”          

He frowned and, with more struggle than the task warranted, placed the caller as a coworker.          

“Remy?” Logan asked, voice coming out incredibly monotone.          

A sigh on the other line and then a rebuttal came. “You should have called in, gurl. We were worried. It’s not like you to be late, like ever.”          

That’s right. Logan had work today. He was missing work right now. He never missed work. Why didn’t that concern him as much as it should?          

“Sorry, I had to come home,” Logan explained, puzzled by his own answer.          

“You should have called,” Remy said again, though more calmed. “Ah, it’s probably lucky you didn’t come in today anyway.”          

“Why?”          

“There was this accident with a bus down the road. Can you believe it? I heard someone got hit. Everyone’s been in a tizzy.”          

The guy. The brunet he’d met eyes with. The smiling stranger a bus slammed into—          

“I saw it,” Logan admitted.          

“Saw it? Saw what?”          

“The guy . . . I saw it happen,” he responded, voice small and ringing in his ears. “I was there.”          

“Oh. _Oh_. Oh Lo,” Remy began, tone racing to sympathy. Whatever he was thinking, it was far worse than that. Logan wanted to tell him, tell him about the encounter, the way the guy was smiling at him when the bus hit him. He’d wanted to tell someone earlier, had _needed_ to share that and let it out. But now. . . .          

“I need to go Remy,” he said suddenly.          

“What? Wait,” Remy started but was cut off.          

“I’ll talk later, goodbye.”          

Logan hurriedly hung up. It was only when he stared down at his phone that he noticed his hands were shaking. How strange; he didn’t feel cold.          

The rest of his day proceeded in a stilted fashion. He would lay down but then rise to pace around his apartment. He’d turn on the TV and his eyes, along with his thoughts, would stray from the screen. His throat tightened up every now and then in a suppressed sob, these moments alternating with bouts of anger, like when he stopped brushing his hair to violently throw a brush in the bathtub.          

On and off. Back and forth.          

His emotions couldn’t decide on where to settle. He’d seen a man die that day, and he couldn’t eat or clean out the dishwasher without the memory slapping him anew. He wanted to pretend it didn’t happen, or at the very least like it didn’t affect him. He didn’t want to remember that smile or the look in his eyes and feel this gnawing grief. He hadn’t even known him.          

His mind continued in a cycle, over and over, on into the coldest hours of the night. Nearing dawn, he fell into a restless sleep until his alarm clock reminded him that he had work today.          

Defeated, he dragged himself from the tangle of sheets. He bathed, he dressed, he ate—all the while with a blessedly blank mind. It was as unthinking as his walk home yesterday, so it was no surprise when he checked the time to find himself running late.         

Logan put his cereal bowl in the sink and headed out the door. The farther he walked in the fresh air, the more his numb senses stretched and let the blood flow once more. This was routine, going to work, and he could fall into it gladly. As his mind gained momentum, so did his body. Encouraged by the swiftly passing time, Logan picked up his pace in a run. He’d never put this much effort into hurrying to work before, not even when he’d ran later than he did today. But something prompted him into a jog and he didn’t stop to question it.         

Down the road from his workplace, Logan nearly tripped onto his face and managed to save himself by stumbling over the curb. He righted himself, still holding his breath from almost falling, and looked up.         

The first thing he saw was that he stood outside the coffee shop he frequented. Next he saw through the window where a man was sitting. It was the man from yesterday, the one who got hit by a bus.   

Logan gaped at the sight. He remembered yesterday clearly, could recall the man’s exact expression when the bus barreled into him. And yet, here he was, sitting at a table inside, very much alive and looking Logan’s way. He seemed taken aback by Logan’s intense stare, as if it wasn’t odd at all that he was sitting at a table without a scratch on him.          

A dream? Had yesterday been some strange, lucid dream?         

It had to be, seeing as how the man was right in front of Logan, just as alive as he’d been before the bus hit him. It was really him, same purple-streaked hair, shadowed under-eyes, and patchworked hoodie. It was him and he was _alive_.         

A wave of pure joy swelled in Logan the likes of which he’d never felt. He couldn’t help but smile at the man, his eyes prickling with wet heat. It didn’t matter that this man didn’t know him or was confused by his actions. Logan wanted to laugh in happiness, because he was alive and that’s all that mattered.          

As he watched him, the man’s expression flickered with some emotion, something like horror. The next instant, a brutal force slammed into Logan’s side. His flesh flattened, his bones crushed, and for a split-second the world fell and he along with it.          

Then it was over.

**Author's Note:**

> "Wait, so we're stuck in a loop?"  
> "You can say that again."


End file.
